December 12, 2008 12:41PM # Does Obama Know Blagojevich? By [David Boaz](https://www.cato.org/people/david-boaz) --- SHARE At the top of the front page of the *Washington Post*, [Eli Saslow’s article](http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/12/11/AR2008121103936.html) is headlined “**Obama Worked to Distance Self From Blagojevich Early On**.” The article assures us that they’re very different kinds of Chicago politicians, and they barely know each other. Obamaphile Abner Mikva says, “Obama saw this coming, and he was very cautious about not having dealings with the governor for quite some time.” But Saslow never mentions a very interesting statement from Obama’s incoming chief of staff, Rep. Rahm Emanuel, that had been reported by [ABC](http://blogs.abcnews.com/politicalpunch/2008/12/questions-arise.html), the [*Wall Street Journal*](http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122895356506696347.html), and other sources in the past few days. Emanuel told *The* *New Yorker* earlier this year that six years ago he and Mr. Obama “participated in a small group that met weekly when Rod was running for governor. We basically laid out the general election, Barack and I and these two \[other participants\].” Original *New Yorker* story [here](http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2008/07/21/080721fa_fact_lizza?currentPage=all). True, one of those other two participants, strategist David Wilhelm, said that Emanuel had overstated Obama’s role. But Rahm Emanuel, a totally connected Chicago pol who is now Obama’s White House chief of staff, says that he and Obama were key strategists for Blagojevich. And that statement had been widely reported. How could Saslow and his editors not mention it? Sometimes the article’s a bit mysterious. For instance, this paragraph is supposedly about how Obama kept his distance from Blago, but the facts seem to be more about Blago keeping away from Obama: > Long before federal prosecutors charged Blagojevich with bribery this week, Obama had worked to distance himself from his home-state governor. The two men have not talked for more than a year, colleagues said, save for a requisite handshake at a funeral or public event. Blagojevich rarely campaigned for Obama and never stumped with him. The governor arrived late at the Democratic convention and skipped Obama’s victory-night celebration at Chicago’s Grant Park. And this paragraph? Shouldn’t the phrase “Even though” actually be “Because”? > Even though they often occupied the same political space — two young lawyers in Chicago, two power brokers in Springfield, two ambitious men who coveted the presidency — Obama and Blagojevich never warmed to each other, Illinois politicians said. They sometimes used each other to propel their own careers but privately acted like rivals. ##### Related Tags [Government and Politics](https://www.cato.org/government-politics) [![Creative Commons License](/build/cato_2020/images/creative-commons.svg)](http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/) This work is licensed under a [Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/).